daftandbarmy
Army.ca Fossil
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Trump administration 2024-2028
- Thread starter dimsum
- Start date
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And what happens next these days with at least some of the cuts?Trump continues to recklessly discard implements of American soft power. Today, Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, and other similar pro-democracy media funded by the U.S. for many decades were gutted.
Trump guts staff at Voice of America and other pro-democracy, US-funded media organizations
The Agency for Global Media also sent notices terminating grants to Radio Free Asia and other programming run by the agency.fortune.com
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty sues Trump administration for blocking funding - UPI.com
The independent international news organization Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty sued the United States Agency for Global Media for trying to stop a grant it was awarded by Congress.
www.upi.com
RFE/RL Sues USAGM to Block Termination of Federal Grant
The grant cancellation would violate the Constitution and federal laws, according to the case filed by RFE/RL in the US District Court for DC
about.rferl.org
An interesting rationale for the cuts from the new advisor
USAGM, Senior Advisor Kari Lake cancels obscenely expensive 15-year-lease that burdened the taxpayers and enforces Trump's Executive Order to drastically downsize agency
Today, in compliance with President Trump's Executive Order titled, Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy, dated March 14, 2025, the US Agency for Global Media initiated measures to eliminate the non-statutory components and functions to the maximum extent consistent with...
www.usagm.gov
On that bit in yellow, I guess when POTUS47's Truth Social feed already parrots a lot of the talking points of America's adversaries, why reward duplication?
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Glass-half-full take: we'll soon see a drop in reported attempts at Russian hybrid shenanigans.
"Exclusive: US suspends some efforts to counter Russian sabotage as Trump moves closer to Putin" (Reuters wire service)
www.themoscowtimes.com
"Exclusive: US suspends some efforts to counter Russian sabotage as Trump moves closer to Putin" (Reuters wire service)
U.S. Suspends Monitoring of Russia’s Hybrid Warfare – Reuters - The Moscow Times
The Trump administration halted a multiagency effort to track and counter Russia’s hybrid warfare campaign against the West, a program launched under former U.S.
www.themoscowtimes.com
Ladies and Gentlemen, introducing the next President of the United States…Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.Glass-half-full take: we'll soon see a drop in reported attempts at Russian hybrid shenanigans.
"Exclusive: US suspends some efforts to counter Russian sabotage as Trump moves closer to Putin" (Reuters wire service)
U.S. Suspends Monitoring of Russia’s Hybrid Warfare – Reuters - The Moscow Times
The Trump administration halted a multiagency effort to track and counter Russia’s hybrid warfare campaign against the West, a program launched under former U.S.
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Ummm.
How relevant do you think Canada's legislative branch is, given that ALL power is concentrated in PMO and PCO, and all votes (with very few exceptions) are whipped votes. We may as well not even have MPs at this point, given that all decisions are taken by the Executive branch - one that has proved in the past that they do not feel bound even by Cabinet decisions.
I have zero faith that that will change after our next "election" that choses local representatives, who will almost certainly remain completely neutered
Blackadder1916
Army.ca Fixture
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FTFY
HavokFour
Sr. Member
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4D chess? The US based defence companies won't be too happy, that's a ton of money. Interestingly though that both South Korea and Japan are welcome, while (for now) the UK is not.
www.politico.eu
EU slams the door on US in colossal defense plan
Bloc aims to build up military-industrial complex to deter Russia and brace for the U.S. shift away from Europe.
www.politico.eu
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Still pretty relevant, as what comes out of Parliament is the legislative branch in action (even if the parties in power do whipped votes and are generally spineless). But the PMO isn't doing things like ordering approved funds that were in the budget to not being paid, overriding departmental authorities and all kinds of nonsense. We don't have an equivalent to the POTUS split really, and things like OIC, Cabinet powers etc are pretty well defined (and very rarely actually exercised to their full extent).
Trump is actively ignoring and trying to override the legislative and legal branch via executive orders that are actively against the Constitution. He's doing that with overt threats to judges, with DOGE overiding all kinds of things (and ignoring security clearance requirements) while having no real authority. The fact that some of this is backed up by municipal police forces (like taking over the office of a not-for profit agency) is nuts.
Putting the whataboutism aside, he's objectively ignoring the checks and balances of the US constitution while his cronies sit back or cheer him on to do even more undemocratic, authoritarian stuff, under a false flag of war measures and manufactured crises.
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Makes sense from a supply chain/security point of view for EU to buy EU military equipment preferrentially, as the more customers you have the easier things are to maintain and operate together with.4D chess? The US based defence companies won't be too happy, that's a ton of money. Interestingly though that both South Korea and Japan are welcome, while (for now) the UK is not.
EU slams the door on US in colossal defense plan
Bloc aims to build up military-industrial complex to deter Russia and brace for the U.S. shift away from Europe.
Not surprised about the UK though; they are still in the 'find out' stage of Brexit, but they always had healthy competition in Europe with a lot of other manufacturers anyway so believe most of their exports are to the Middle East and Asia (plus things like licensing the T26 to us and Aus).
Brad Sallows
Army.ca Legend
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That point hasn't been decided. The fact the administration is effectively asking the question in a lot of contexts doesn't alter the fact it has to be answered in each.
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Doing things with impunity then threatening judges, congressman, senators and civilians you don't like is hardly 'asking the question'.
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A bit long, but informative.
Ferguson is giving the Trump administration's shocking approach the benefit of a doubt but the big 'If' is: what if it doesn't work?
Conflict: Niall Ferguson on Ukraine, Taiwan, and His War of Words with V. P. Vance
Niall Ferguson, preeminent historian, discuss the war and ongoing stalemate in Ukraine; the Trump administration’s foreign policy and negotiations with Russia; and the broader geopolitical landscape, including the shift in Europe’s defense posture as the US signals a reduced commitment to NATO.
Conflict: Niall Ferguson On Ukraine, Taiwan, And His War Of Words With V. P. Vance
Niall Ferguson, preeminent historian, discuss the war and ongoing stalemate in Ukraine; the Trump administration’s foreign policy and negotiations with Russia; and the broader geopolitical landscape, including the shift in Europe’s defense posture as the US signals a reduced commitment to NATO.www.hoover.org
Doomed. Doomed I tell ye.
We're no known as dour without reason.
Momentary glimmer of light. 10 years down the road. AI and Technology. They might save us eventually. But what about today?
....
Hamoukar - Syria, 3500 BC. In a war over a city positioned on a strategic material trade route, and known for its expertise in working that strategic material we find the ground littered with these.
These are sun-dried clay bullets. Manufactured locally in their thousands and stockpiled at strategic locations around the city. They city was known for working with a black, volcanic glass, still prized today for supplying cutting edges finer than any steel scalpel: Obsidian. It was the rare earth of its day. It had been for 10,000 years previous. Since 14,000 BC.
Earliest evidence for large scale organized warfare in the Mesopotamian world
A huge battle destroyed one of the world's earliest cities at around 3500 B.C. and left behind, preserved in their places, artifacts from daily life in an urban settlement in upper Mesopotamia, according to a joint announcement from the University of Chicago and the Department of Antiquities in...
...
Digression. Why do we make things out of iron? Bronze makes better blades and did up until modern furnaces and alloying caught up. The reason for the Iron Age was that Iron is found everywhere, virtually. Bronze required arsenic or tin and those materials came from a very limited number of sources. The supply chains were long and expensive and subject to political favouritism.
...
WW2. Ships sinking. Need to build ships faster than they could be sunk. Enter technological innovation.
Liberty ship - Wikipedia
Concrete ship - Wikipedia
Project Habakkuk - Wikipedia
Project Habakkuk's Pykrete mix of wood chips and ice was a failure
The concrete ships were a qualified failure although they ultimately inspired the ocean going caissons of the Mulberry Harbours of Normandy.
The Liberty Ships though, were a success, although some failed - they cracked in mid ocean before the enemy could get to them due to poorly tempered steel made in a hurry by inexperienced work forces. But more of the prefab ships, made from prefab sections, some with concrete interior decks, survived long enough to make themselves useful.
One of them survives as the Star of Kodiak, landlocked in Kodiak harbor where she was pressed into service as a seafood processor after a 1964 tsunami wiped out the water front.
...
All of which brings me to where I think we are today.
...
Archaeologists can date eras by the materials found in the garbage dumps. Rocks and bones. Clays and ceramics of various types. Concrete, bricks and tiles. Copper, Bronze, Iron.... Steel. And today .... Plastic. (Wood and leather deteriorate and don't survive).
Plastic is ubiquitous. Plastic survives. Plastic has replaced paper, wood, pottery, steel, aluminum, iron and silicon. Plastic is cheap. Plastic is flexible, in all the many ways that you might want to use that word.
We have swapped the foundries of the Iron Age, the ones that supplied the materials for the Liberty Ships of WW2, along with the aluminum smelters that provided Boeing with their materials in Seattle, for plastic forming factories fed by hydrocarbons.
We have lots of hydrocarbons. And we have lots of facilities capable of producing specialized plastics and of forming them into things. Including things that can kill and things that can transport.
Couple plastic with 3D printing, along with materials like metals, including aluminum, bronze and lead as well as clay and in the next two years we could start stockpiling plastic rockets, plastic bullets, plastic boats, plastic submarines. Where plastic will not suffice then the other materials offer adjuncts to cover over the weak points.
....
Which brings me to Anduril and its 3D printing of vessels and aircraft.
3D printing of propellants
3D Printing for Explosives and Propellants Applications
3D printing technology is considered the perfect modern manufacturing technology for military/industrial enterprises worldwide. Applying 3D printing i…
www.sciencedirect.com
3D printing of jet engines
GE Aerospace to scale the production 3D printed jet engines with $650 million investment - 3D Printing Industry
GE Aerospace, the aerospace and aviation division of US energy multinational General Electric (GE), has announced plans to invest over $650 million into its global manufacturing plants and supply chain this year. The Ohio-based engine manufacturer hopes that this investment will increase its...
3dprintingindustry.com
And add in
Kratos XQ-58 Valkyrie - Wikipedia
And
4.5 Million Drones Is A Lot Of Drones. It’s Ukraine’s Goal For 2025.
The Russian production goal is slightly lower.
www.forbes.com
New Canadian PM discusses security guarantees, bilateral cooperation in call with Zelensky
Newly elected Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney discussed increasing pressure on Moscow, particularly by imposing additional sanctions against Russia's banking sector and its so-called "shadow fleet" of oil tankers.
kyivindependent.com
...
If we can't do things the conventional way then we will be forced to do things the other way....and make the best of it.
Even if it means learning how to do things differently because we can't do what we use to do in the good old days.
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Further to Ferguson's, and the CIA's and most intelligence agencies's, sense that the window of vulnerability is the next two to three years, and, in my opinion we should start acting like its 1938 all over again, should we start pivoting on production?
It is my belief that there is much we can do with the innovative and the novel. But there is stuff that we can't replace that relies on "ancient" technologies that are being pushed out of service. Facilities like steel foundries.
We need steel for ships and submarines. We also need it for locks, stocks and barrels.
If we have a limited supply of native steel where is that steel best utilized?
In a 100 m AOPS that weighs 6600 tonnes when you can build a 100 m OPV in steel that displaces 3750 tonnes full load and 1500 to 2000 tonnes light (OPV Holland).
In a submarine that won't be available until 2032, after the crisis has been resolved one way or another?
Or in building trucks and guns, particularly medium calibre autocannons and small arms which will be useful in two years time?
Or supplying armour plate? Armour plate that can be "diluted" while still remaining effective, with plastics, and ceramics and explosives?
If we are limited in raw materials should we be spending that raw material on 155mm cannons for depth fires or should we be more reliant on missiles and drones that can be fabricated from composite materials readily available?
In my opinion building Icebreakers in a time of crisis, assuming this is a time of crisis, would be a folly A vanity project. That steel could be put to much better use.
Those two polar icebreakers displace 26,000 tonnes each. How much of that is steel?
How many 60 kg M230 Bushmasters could be manufactured from that steel?
How many 60 tonne Abrams or Leos? Or 30 tonne CV90s?
And which are going to be ready to use in two years?
Brad Sallows
Army.ca Legend
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Unfortunately that "norm" was already breached. It should be restored, but that can only be achieved if the parties who did it earlier credibly demonstrate good faith.
Brad Sallows
Army.ca Legend
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Only if you accept the self-anointed guardian of "democracy" status.
My guess is Americans will continue to vote on way more positions and issues than voters in pretty much every other country.
lenaitch
Army.ca Veteran
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I thought you just said we could 3D print submarines out of plastic.
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Depends whether you want to ride along from what I understand. The Anduril type leaks, intentionally. It keeps the pressure equal on both sides of the shell. Great for carrying torpedoes and mines. Not so good for squishy stuff.
If we want to go along for the ride then the South Koreans are probably a better bet.
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Well, so much for Free Speech:
globalnews.ca
French scientist denied U.S. entry after ‘hateful’ Trump texts found on phone - National | Globalnews.ca
The French researcher was on assignment for the French National Center for Scientific Research, travelling to a conference near Houston, Texas.
globalnews.ca